Trump selects hardliner to be US ambassador to Israel

US president-elect Donald Trump has selected Mike Huckabee, who rejects the term "Palestinian" and supports building settlements, to be the next US ambassador to Israel.

Huckabee's nomination must be confirmed by the US Senate before he assumes the position. He is unlikely to face any major opposition to the appointment, given the Republican party's majority in the upper chamber of Congress. 

"Mike has been a great public servant, Governor, and Leader in Faith for many years," Trump said on Tuesday in a statement.

“He loves Israel, and the people of Israel, and likewise, the people of Israel love him. Mike will work tirelessly to bring about peace in the Middle East!,” Trump added, praising the pastor-turned-politician. 

Huckabee, the former Arkansas governor, is a self-described Zionist and opposes the existence of a Palestinian state. He also stipulates the West Bank belongs to Israel and encourages building illegal Israeli settlements. 

He recently said, “the title deed was given by God to Abraham and to his heirs.” 

The former TV host is opposed to a two-state solution, in contradiction to former US administrations and the international community.

He criticised Israel’s 2005 withdrawal from Gaza and described settlers evacuated by Israeli forces as having been “marched at gunpoint.”

Huckabee also does not recognise the term "Palestinian."

“It’s a term that was co-opted by Yasser Arafat in 1962,” referring to one of the early leaders of the Palestine Liberation Organization.

Donald Trump, during his first term, moved the US Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, recognising it as the capital of Israel. The move broke decades of US policy despite being pro-Israel.

Israel claims the entirety of Jerusalem, however, international law recognises East Jerusalem as Palestinian and West Jerusalem as Israeli.

Trump was the first and only foreign leader to recognize Israel’s control of the Golan, which Israel seized from Syria in the 1967 war, drawing widespread condemnation. 

On Monday, Israel’s Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich pledged to annex Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank in 2025, calling Donald Trump’s return to power in the United States “an important opportunity”.

“The year 2025 will be, with God’s help, the year of sovereignty in Judea and Samaria,” the far-right minister said, using the biblical name for the West Bank.

Smotrich, whose ministerial portfolio also includes some areas of the defense ministry’s work, said he had ordered preparations for “applying sovereignty” over Israeli settlements.

Days before the 2020 election, the Trump administration lifted a decades-old ban that had prohibited US taxpayer funding for Israeli scientific research conducted in Jewish settlements in occupied territory, drawing Palestinian condemnation.

Illegal settlements grew by around 13 per cent under Trump's first administration, however, they also grew under Biden's. In March, Israel approved the construction of about 3,500 new housing units, ​​adding to nearly 20,000 approved in the past year. Their growth notably increased after the latest Israeli aggression in Gaza, as global attention to the West Bank relatively decreased.

Palestinians say the settlers are doing this on private land owned by Palestinians. Over time, the government often grants approval to the illegal outpost, turning it into a formal, authorized Jewish settlement. About 4,555 Palestinians have been displaced in the West Bank in the last year after Israeli forces demolished their homes.